Communicate and fund a special assessment

There are two ways for the community to fund operations. Regular assessments and special assessments. Special assessments are typically big and for specific needs. No one likes special assessments because only the owners living there now have to pay them. Over my 20 -year career as the owner of a management company, I've coached hundreds of board members about how to handle the need to obtain more money from the owners for a specific repair need.

In all cases, The HOA didn't fund their operations properly by regularly increasing their annual assessments. So here are the best practices. One, obtain an expert's report of the asset's condition. Two, start discussing it at board meetings via a preemptive letter to owners describing the situation and actions the board is taking to prepare the community for the next steps. Three. Get three to five bids. If it's a major project, get seven bids and discuss payment terms with each one of those potential contractors because the longer you can spread it out at no interest, the better you will be.

Four. Analyze your association's ability to pay and over what length of time. If you have a working -class neighborhood, You may want to spread it over as much as possible to keep the monthly or semiannual payment small. If you have a more well -off community, they may be willing to pay more in a shorter time frame, but your job is to analyze the ability to pay by talking to people of what would work for them because you need them on board.

Preparing a presentation at the next board meeting. And while you do that, make sure the topic's on the pre -published agenda so those interested people, owners, can attend. And make sure it gets out to people because it's going to be a hot topic and if you're trying to hide the fact that you're having the meeting, then it's going to blow up in your face. 6. Invite the expert to give their report orally. to the community and leave enough time for questions and answers.

And seven, request feedback. Discuss the amount and even the payment terms before finalizing any request or vote by the community. It's likely that your current board members were not at fault for the delays and having the repairs made. But you're the ones who are responsible to see that the work's completed. You did the right thing. You made sure that the assets in the community are being maintained properly and people who buy and people who sell and people who live there know that what they have is going to last a long time.

It's their biggest asset usually. Their home, their condominium, their condo, their townhouse. And ultimately... They want it to be maintained properly and they're willing to pay for it. This approach will minimize the owners who want to slam you on Facebook or other social media platforms and never engage with them on social media to defend yourself. That's a bad idea. And the communication on social media is only getting to a small group of homeowners that are savvy and or looking for that information.

So you want to keep your communication to the formal and official letter from your management company. You create the narrative. You control the narrative. Managers, you're going to take a lot of calls. Have talking points close to your phone so you can keep consistent in your responses. Keep it positive as repairs will be made and that board is taking responsibility to fix past problems that were neglected.